Sara Horowitz

Sara Horowitz - Participant

Sara Horowitz is an innovator for tomorrow’s workforce. As Freelancers Union’s Founder and Executive Director, Sara Horowitz has been helping the new workforce build solutions together for nearly two decades.

A MacArthur Foundation “Genius” fellow and Deputy Chair of the Federal Reserve of New York, Sara has long been a leading voice for the emerging economy. Today, 53 million Americans are independent workers – more than one-third of the entire workforce. Relying on her experience as a union organizer and labor lawyer, Sara founded Freelancers Union in 1995 to create power in markets and power in politics for this rising workforce.

While growing Freelancers Union’s membership to more than 250,000 nationwide, Sara has helped develop a new form of unionism driven by social-purpose business models.

Sara recognized that one of the biggest challenges independent workers face is their lack of access to affordable health insurance. To help solve this problem, Sara in 2008 launched Freelancers Insurance Company, a social-purpose business wholly owned by the union providing independent workers with high-quality, affordable, and portable health insurance. The union’s National Benefits Platform, launched in 2014, now helps freelancers across America access benefits like health insurance, 401(k), and life, liability, dental, and disability insurance.

Carrying on the tradition of turn-of-the-century social unionists, Sara has also built two integrated primary care clinics providing no-copay care to union members. The Freelancers Medical sites Brooklyn and Manhattan also host networking events, education classes, and other member events. Sara has been named one of Forbes’ Top 30 Social Entrepreneurs, BusinessWeek’s Top 25 Most Promising Social Entrepreneurs, and the World Economic Forum’s 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow. Her recent book, The Freelancer’s Bible, was named one of Forbes’ “Best Books to Boost Your Career.”

Sara is the daughter of a labor lawyer and granddaughter of a vice president of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union. After studying at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, she earned a law degree from the SUNY Buffalo Law School and a master’s degree from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Sara is a life­long resident of Brooklyn, NY.